“If the Fanghaven heir ever emerges, I hope she’ll be our ally,” I murmur. “She and I would have a chance of keeping Rannigan Bloodthief in a cage.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice?” Arran sighs, handing off his empty plate.
I haven’t eaten much of the dessert course and pick up a fat, purple-black fig. I hand it to Idallia, then reach for the cheese and bread.
She gives me an odd look, and my inner heat rises, flushing my neck. “Did you know I like figs?”
I don’t know if I did. I just figured she would because of the color and texture. I shrug.
“Why didn’t you kill Rannigan Bloodthief all those years ago?” Kellan looks right down the table at me and asks the question no one ever asks. I give him a what-the-fuck look, but he doesn’t stop there. “He wasn’t protected from firebreath back then. How did he get close enough to slice through your chest scales when you could’ve burned him to a crisp or bitten him clean in half?”
Even Wade gapes at Kellan, finding nothing to ease the tension this time.
“I was injured,” I say flatly.
“That was the injury,” Kellan insists. “How did he get that close? You’re not like Idallia. You don’t get distracted and stop paying attention in the middle of a fight.”
While his statement is unfortunately true, my pulse shoots off in anger just as I hear Idallia’s sharp inhalation.
“I kicked your ass today, Kellan,” she snaps. “Even when I was bored to death.”
He cuts her a stony look. “I didn’t fight back.”
“Well, then I guess that makes you the one not paying attention. The goal was to give me a challenge, not leave me yawning and annoyed.”
His chair scrapes back, and he stands. “I have things to do tomorrow. I’ll see you all the morning after for the race to the pillars.”
Kellan turns to leave, and I can’t help the words that catapult from my mouth. “There won’t be a race. Maia flies right wing, since she was the only one to best Idallia. Idallia flies left wing, since she bested everyone else. The rest of you can work yourselves out.” I lean back in my chair and cross my hands behind my head, not sure if I’m pleased with myself for stunning them all silent, or worried I’m making unprecedented decisions I can’t fully explain even to myself.
I strive for humor, if only to calm my own racing heart. “Come now. I know we’re carnivores, but let’s not catch flies in those open mouths.”
Everyone snaps their mouth shut except for Idallia. She laughs, and I instantly crave more of the spontaneous, soul-lightening sound. She’s the real reason I’m here tonight, isn’t she? The reason I don’t like solitude nearly as much as I used to.
Sensations from earlier today flood back to me again on a hard rush of blood. The throbbing heat of her pulse jumping up to reach me when my lips don’t even touch her throat. Her scent, like bright sunshine on crisp new snow. The cold lake around us, and her battle-hot body under mine, shapely and strong.
A sense of doom settles over me as everyone finishes their meal, and I start to wish I’d just stayed alone in my lair tonight. I wonder if there’s a name for a card player who keeps an ace up his sleeve for so long that he forgets what part of the game the card is meant for, and now just wants to keep it close to his skin, where it’s already been for years.
CHAPTER TEN
IDALLIA
“What do you know about the fourteenth scale?” I ask my firebirds as we fly over the lake on our own after a morning training session without Bale. He told us to “get in a good workout” before disappearing somewhere, which really meant to run our asses off but not pick up a sword.
Our wing guards followed us from the sky, but our running pace is nothing compared to their speed. After a long jog around Upper Drayke Lake, my birds and I went back to our quarters so I could get cleaned up, but Embersol kept driving us all crazy with her zipping around the room. As soon as I’d bathed and put on fresh clothes, we went back out to zig and zag over the forest and lake instead of watching her bounce off the walls.
“There was no fourteenth scale,” Rim answers. His reddish-gold feathers ruffle in the wind, and sparks stream off him, leaving a glowing trail. Next to him, Sol is just one little fireball, blazing from beak to tail. The joy on her face makes my heart swell.
Fyrestar banks left to follow the natural curve at the end of the lake, and I grip his sides harder with my legs to keep from sliding but leave my hands loose at my sides. The younger birds follow his lead, and the high towers of the Drayke School of Fire and Flight come into view over the treetops between us and the city of Drayke.
I hold back a shudder and look away.
“But wouldn’t there have been a scale where Rannigan Bloodthief actually punctured Bale’s chest? The Vampire King shredded thirteen scales, but they were still there, just too damaged to properly heal. Bale removed those scales and used them to create you birds—thirteen phoenixes. But what about right where the Vampire King pierced his chest? What about that scale?”
“The Vampire King probably destroyed it,” Fyrestar says.
I grimace, a vivid image of red blood dripping from sharp, black nails suddenly invading my mind. It’s real and intense, and I somehow know it’s Rannigan’s hand, even though I’ve never seen the Vampire King myself. Only Maia and Arran, the two senior members of the Elite Wing, have ever remained in Drayke during a Council meeting or have even seen the other starborn rulers of Ellonrift.
“Yeah…maybe there was just nothing left.” But what if there was? If Bale and his sorcerers could make our warbirds from his thirteen damaged scales, what could the Vampire King and his sorcerers make with one?
